Tag Archives: fleer e-x

If you say the title, My Acetate Problem, really slow it sounds like I need some Preparation H. As Austin Powers said, “Preparation H is good on the whole.” But my problem is more of the sports card variety. For some strange reason, I love acetate cards.

I remember the first time I ever received an acetate card. I was in a horribly over priced card shop in 1999. I had just moved practically right next door to Grand Slam Sports Cards in Vernon, CT. I doubt you can find anything about that shop nowadays as it’s been out of business for probably 10 years now.

I was buying a couple packs of cards with some left over lunch money I had saved and decided to buy some football since football season had just started. I saw a product that the packaging looked cool and bought a pack of it. It was 1999 Fleer E-X football. I opened it up and found two cards, great design and I could see right through them. I was bewildered, bemused, and befuddled at the same time.

What kind of alien technology is this? I never thought I could see through Jerome Bettis. I put that card and the other from the pack in my favorite pile when I got home. I did it not because they were valuable, but because I had thought they looked so cool.

A few months later I took a hiatus from the hobby. When I came back 6 years later, I had completely forgot about acetate cards until a friend sent me a gift. A Cam Ward Upper Deck ICE Glacialgraph. THE ACETATE! I was instantly brought back to 1999 in this card shop with my friend Eric when I caught my first glimpse of clear cardboard. I peered through my new Cam Ward card looking through to the other side, moving my hand back and forth, and admiring the card as well as showing how easily amused I am.

Since then, I’ve been loving every set that comes out with acetate or clear cards in it. UD Glass, Trilogy, and everything I could find had to be in my collection. I hated when I heard that Upper Deck would not be coming out with ICE again this year. But then, redemption! The good kind. Panini’s new product Contenders hockey will have some of this acetate-sty goodness in it. The best part is their featured card on their blog has another Carolina Hurricane on it, Tuomo Ruutu. The guy who usually puts other player’s faces through the glass.

So I ask, if anyone has any acetate-sty cards to trade me of teams I collect, please send them this way. Just like I’ll be hunting down this Tuomo Ruutu autograph.

Note: You do not want to be between the glass and this guy. You might go through it.